Lost In The Grind

In case anyone was wondering, I have been trying to set aside some time for a meaningful post here, but I have been getting ready for the big airshow here at Andrews…Basically what it means to me is long hours and some added stress, after this though we are coasting…

Here is a link if you want to know what it’s all about…

www.jsoh.org

3 more days…

In case you haven’t seen all the news about the release of information about the Death Knight, go check it all out at wowinsider.com and come back here…okay?

Well, I’m not going to talk about all the cool abilities and spells and stuff, what I would like to talk about is how I plan to decide on which character to “turn” into a deathknight.  According to the news, you are allowed to have one deathknight character per realm per account.  The only prerequisite is that the toon be at least level 55.  Any race/class can become a deathknight.

So, as I take a look at my characters I have that are level 55 I also think, what if I turn both of my level 70 characters into deathknights?  Will all the time and energy I spent gearing up my elemental shaman in PvP gear go to waste?  I don’t know for certain, but I would think that deathknights, being dual-wielding tanks, would wear plate armor…It is a hard decision for sure, then I think, the next highest level character I have on the horde side is a female blood elf paladin which I currently use as a bank toon, do I want to play a female toon again?  Not really…so then the next highest level character I have that I would most likely level to 55 would be my priest…that would be the most likely character that I would try to level up and change into a deathknight, primarily because I love playing my elemental shaman too much to abandon him now…

Now, as far as the alliance side of the house, it’s kind of strange how spread out all of my characters have become…for example, I have my original warrior toon, Tabeyus, he is level 60 and sitting on Ghostlands, the same server as my Horde family.  Next, I have my female warlock, level 60, she is on Sen’jin along with my dwarf hunter who is level 70…But for the past few months I have been spending most of my time playing alliance on Eldre’Thalas where you find my favorite character, Tabeyus, my level 70 resto druid along with my other lower level alts…

So, also that I am cutting back my play time a lot, I feel I should focus more on one faction and probably just one main character and one alt.  Currently, I have the most pull toward my horde toons, which coincidentally also has the most success in the battlegrounds and Arenas…so as of right now, Rekkr, my holy priest will be making the descent and becoming a deathknight…trading his robes and staff for plate and swords…surely the adventure will be one worth telling…

I checked the order status page and it says the order has been processed and the expected shipping date is 20 May 08.  This is 14 days after the initial order was made.  Supposedly they have a 5 to 10 day window after the order has been placed to get things shipped off…obviously this isn’t always the case.  At least they are updating the page so I can see what is going on…since it will be coming from California and I live in Maryland, it will most likely take an additional week to reach my door.

So, hopefully by Memorial Day weekend (last weekend of May for those outside the U.S.) I will be enjoying the new machine…

For anyone interested, I updated the about page…no idea what to write there…I know sorry excuse for a post, but oh well, shoot me!

After three years we are finally getting a new computer!  I have to say I am pretty excited about it.  My loving wife agreed to the purchase last night, love you honey!

So, we went to dell and I put together an XPS machine, but I just didn’t like the look of it or the fact that is isn’t necessarily a “gaming” machine.  So, we took a trip to cyberpowerpc.com and I put together a machine for under $1500.  Here are the specs:

Intel Core 2 Duo Custom Build Configurator (NO MONITOR)
CFGC2DZ, www.cyberpowerpc.com/system/Intel_Core_2_Duo_Custom_Build_Configurator/
*BASE_PRICE: [+549]
CAS: NEW!!! CoolerMaster Cosmos Silent Gaming Tower Case w/ 420 Watts Power Supply [+117] (Original Color)
CPU: (Sckt775)Intel® Core™ 2 Duo E8400 CPU @ 3.0GHz 1333FSB 6MB L2 Cache 64-bit [+40]
CD: (Special Price) 20X DVD±R/±RW + CD-R/RW DRIVE DUAL LAYER (BLACK COLOR)
FLASHMEDIA: INTERNAL 12in1 Flash Media Reader/Writer (BLACK COLOR)
FAN: CoolerMaster Hyper TX2 Gaming CPU Cooling Fan (Extreme Silent Operation at only 22dBA + Overclock Proof) [+19]
FLOPPY: 1.44 MB FLOPPY DRIVE (BLACK COLOR)
HDD: Single Hard Drive (500GB SATA-II 3.0Gb/s 16MB Cache 7200RPM HDD [+46])
MOTHERBOARD: ($15 off Mail-in Rebate) MSI P35 Neo-F P35 Chipset LGA775 Supports Core 2 Duo CPU FSB1333 DDR2/800 Mainboard w/GbLAN,USB2.0,&7.1Audio [+16]
MEMORY: (Req.DDR2 MainBoard)4GB (4×1GB) PC6400 DDR2/800 Dual Channel Memory [+100] (Corsair or Major Brand)
NETWORK: ONBOARD 10/100 NETWORK CARD
OS: Microsoft® Windows Vista™ Home Basic w/ Service Pack 1 [+89] (32-bit Edition)
POWERSUPPLY: 600 Watts Power Supplies [+59] (CoolerMaster Unit 600 Watts eXtreme Power - SLI Supports) SOUND: 3D WAVE ON-BOARD 5.1 SOUND CARD
SPEAKERS: Logitech R-20 2.1 Configuration Subwoofer Speakers System [+9]
USB: Built-in USB 2.0 Ports
UPS: OPTI-UPS VS575C 575VA/345W UNINTERRUPT POWER SUPPLY - Recommended [+46]
VIDEO: NVIDIA GeForce 8800 GT 1GB 16X PCI Express [+270] (Major Brand Powered by NVIDIA)
_PRICE: (+1348)
Shipping: Fedex Ground $65.00

GRAND TOTAL $1,413.00
My choice for the case came from the maximumpc dream machine 2007…  It is sleek, and just looks cool I think.  As far as the processor, I decided to stick with the intel core duo 2 running at 3.0GHz it should provide ample computing power teamed up with the 4GB of RAM and the 1GB NVIDIA GeForce 8800 GT video card I should stay up to par with the latest games coming out and finally be able to see the Lord of the Rings in all its’ beauty…

I have read reviews about cyberpowerpc and I know that the company hasn’t had the best track record with all of its’ customers, but I feel that the price makes it worth it.  I will update more once I get the machine and let you all know how things go. 

Sharing a video of the song by Stone Sour, 1st Person…the video itself isn’t anything special, but the music is.  I feel a lot of energy listening to these guys…enjoy!

Here is one of those posts where I talk about how I don’t share too much going on my life and how no matter what is said or done the only thing capable of making changes in my life is me.  Searching my heart and seeing where things have gone because of things I have or haven’t done has made me realize how lucky I am to be married to my wife.  Letting go of things that I have held to tightly has given me freedom to see things differently.

I am once again feeling the burnout of WoW, like so many other people out there, it seems to be an endless cycle with no end in sight.  I am constantly chasing the proverbial carrot on a stick only occasionally getting a nibble which only increases my appetite and leaves me frustrated.  Don’t get me wrong I have made friends in my adventures and I find my escape in this world, but when it comes down to it, they cannot replace what I already have right here at home…

Don’t get me wrong, I am not giving up, but I am going to be cutting back my gaming time quite a bit. 

Expect to see some design changes of the blog.  Also, one big change I have made is Tabeyus, my feral druid is now fully resto specced…I really enjoy healing after all…go go tree form!

Look for more meaningful posts in the near future, in between real life issues and other things going on I haven’t had the initiative to keep things going here…slowly but surely I am regaining balance.  Never an easy thing to maintain.

I hardly ever never do this type of thing…but I have been laughing my ass off for the past 15 minutes as I have been reading the blog written by Runyarusco called Unbearably HoT and I have to share it with you all here…

The title alone made me lol…go check it out!

Of course anyone who has a level 70 character in WoW is aware of the fact that there are numerous daily quests to complete. I myself have done a lot, but not all, of them since the 2.4 patch. Every single one of them reward you with gold and a lot of them will even give you items, the latest daily quests even give you badges of justice which you can turn in for gear or various other items. As for me, I have only done the quests that give the badges a few times and out of those few times I was given a few badges in total. The quests themselves aren’t difficult to complete, but they require some traveling and time to get done. If I wanted to complete the maximum number of daily quests, which is 25 right now, I could do that, but after a while it get’s really boring. The other option would be to team up with a partner or even a group and knock out these quests together, this at least makes the time spent grinding them out more enjoyable.

To this day, I REFUSE to go find the skettis escort guy and save his ass one more time…that is one daily quest that causes a lot of frustration for players, and those of you who have done it time and time again know what I mean…he spawns in one of three locations…people are standing by these spots all the time, you can create a party, but even if half the party is sitting at another spawn point and person outside your party and fly up and start the quest…it get’s really old…

As far the the new dailys are concerned, I find myself concentrating on all the quests available at the Isle of Quel’Danas. My typical routine is to get to the Isle of Quel’Danas and pick up all the available quests, currently we are in phase 3 on both Eldre’Thalas (currently 80% complete) and Ghostlands (currently 40% complete), usually I start out killing the demons near the portal, impale the banner into the Emmisary of Hate and get the ley lines done for the portal at the same time. Then I will make my way over to the Blood Knights and Marksmen and Summoners and get the next ley line completed. Then I will take out the wretches for the 4 raiments and kill the Arcane machines and turn them into good guys…Next I use the raiments on the blood shard crystal and then ride up to the dragonhawk mount fellow and do the bombing run over the boats and take out the 6 guys there, return and complete the bombing run on the dead scar. The dead scar bombing run was very frustrating to me the first few times I tried to do it, mainly because the whole island was so crowded it was near impossible to get all the kills you needed because everyone else was dropping bombs at the same time. These days I get all the kills I need 9 times out of 10 the first trip. Once that is complete, I run over and turn in the quests I have done so far, then I make my way over to the Nagas and farm them until I get the keys I need to open up the chests and get the ore and also finish my last ley line while I am in the area.

As of right now, these are the quests available to us in the third phase of the daily quests. I am hoping we reach phase 4 this weekend on Eldre’Thalas, also, as of right now both Tabeyus and Drollam are both honored with the Shattered Sun Offensive, there are various recipes and nice items available for reasonable prices as your rep gets higher.

As far as all the other daily quests out there, I have only done them a few times and because of the limited playtime I have had lately I find it much easier to spend an hour completing 7 or 8 quests and gaining reputation a very good investment of my time.